Skywatch Line for Friday, March 14, through Sunday, March 16, written by Sam Salem
This is Dudley Observatory’s Skywatch Line for Friday, March 14, through Sunday, March 16, written by Sam Salem.
On Friday, Sun rises at 7:08am and sets at 7:01pm; Moon sets at 7:18am and rises at 7:37pm.
For North America the total Lunar Eclipse happens late on Thursday night – early Friday morning. Partial eclipse begins at 1:09 am Friday morning, total eclipse begins at 2:26 am, mid-eclipse is at 2:59 am, total eclipse ends at 3:32 am, and partial eclipse ends at 4:48 am.
On Friday, the very slightly gibbous Moon, less than a day past full, rises in twilight. As it climbs higher after dark, watch Spica below it, by about two fists at arm’s length. Spica rises about 2 hours after the Moon does.
on Saturday, the waning Moon rises around the end of twilight, with Spica less than a fist beneath it. Right of Spica by a fist and a half, look for the four-star pattern of Corvus, the springtime Crow. About twice as far left of Spica and the Moon sparkles Arcturus, the brightest star in the constellation of Boötes the Herdsman.
Look for Mercury, magnitude +1.6, about 40 or 50 minutes after sunset, low in the west. It remains well placed in the evening twilight but it’s fading fast. Mercury is about 5½° or 6° apart of Venus. Use binoculars to help you locate Mercury. Look for it 6° to Venus’s left.
Venus, magnitude –4.5 in the constellations of Pisces, is the bright “Evening Star” in the west in twilight. It’s dropping lower day by day. This weekend it’s setting while the last of twilight is still in progress. Venus now is a remarkably thin crescent in a telescope or binoculars. It narrows to just 4% sunlit on Friday. Get your telescope on it as early in twilight before is sinks too deep into the bad low altitude seeing. You can locate it telescopically in the blue-sky daylight of late afternoon. Venus is on its way to passing a wide 8.4° north of the Sun at inferior conjunction on March 22nd.
Mars, about magnitude 0.0 in central of the constellation of Gemini, comes into view in twilight as a steady orange spark very high toward the south. It continues to fade as it shrinks into the distance. As darkness deepens, watch for fainter Pollux and Castor to emerge upper left of it. The triangle the three of them make is changing faster now, as Mars appears to accelerate away from the end of its retrograde loop. The three become an exact right triangle on Saturday.
Jupiter shines bright white in the constellation of Taurus, 36° west along the ecliptic from Mars. Jupiter dominates the high southwest after dusk near Aldebaran and the Pleiades. The triangle it makes with them is becoming isosceles, with the Pleiades forming the triangle’s long point. Later in the evening Jupiter moves lower toward the west. It sets in the west-northwest around 2 am.
On Friday evening, Algol should be at its minimum brightness, magnitude 3.4 instead of its usual 2.1, for about two hours centered on 8:26pm.